Real tests in sustained 50 to 70 km/h sustained winds

[E-Copter]

Hi,

i wanted to check by myself how a standard frame and 2 axis gimbal ( Mikrokopter Hexa XL and DSLR II gimbal) performed in REAL winds after seeing some let's say promo videos on internet...

As usual i was using the little " Box " for system and gimbal stabilisation.

I made this video today at the C.E.M.A. center, a UAV /UAS new entity located at " Domaine du Planet", which is one of the nicest place for modellers and now for UAV testings.

YEsterday was " professional" day for UAV /UAS, only 3 machines have flown ( 75 kmh non stop wind all day) :

Infotron, Survey Copter, and... me, in end of day when wind gently dropped to 60 km/h. Was more than impressive as to take off i had to retain the Hexa when launching motors to avoid it to flip over ( lol) but i managed to land in one piece ( pfewwww). Well, honnestly, there is no real benefit in flying in such conditions except to say " yeah it can fly in wind" as the unit spents it's time fighting against the wind and is all time around 45° inclination for this ( lol ).

Today was " only" 50 to 60 km/h continous wind and i decided to fit the camera to check the " urban legends" videos and stories i did see previously on the internet, as from thursday to sunday it's allowed to fly UAV's and prototypes ( my hexa is a registered prototype at french DGAC) everywhere at the domain ))))

2 simple facts :

- It's not possibe to get any kind of decent stabilisation with a 2 axis mikrokopter gimbal, you are all time over the mechanical limits of the gimbal, especially on the roll axis
- It is not possible to hope to zoom on anything and keep it " tracked" with such wind because of the first comment..

BUt well, i would say not bad for a less than 4 kg machine flying in that wind, i was myself pretty happy of the results, you can see the very large planes of the FXFC competition doing "stationnary" in the wind, and also the flags, i think it says it all

Anyway, great fun and one more useless and funny experience for me )

[video]https://vimeo.com/51780485[video]

BEst regards,

Fabien

 

[PaNt]

this thing seems great for so much wind..
We are w8ing to tell us specs prices when it will be out etc..!

 

[E-Copter]

Hi,

for the moment the system is still a prototype and i won't say much as explained in some previous posts (there is a lot of long and hard work enclosed in this little thing and any technical interresting detail i woud write would be a gift for our competitors, there has been a time when i was enthusiastic and shared everything, that time has ben consummed by some unfair people and i have to protect now myself and the people i work with).
But i promess i'll tell more when the time will be

If you are not too far away from California, i'll be there in a few weeks and for maybe one or 2 month, you are welcome to give it a try if you are not too far away from Los Angeles or Morgan Hills

BEst regards,
Fabien

 

[PaNt]

I wish i was near... but i am 10hours far by Aeroplane..! I am from Greece L0L

Are you from France??!


i am w8ing..!

 

[E-Copter]

Hi,

yes, i'm from France, in the back country of " Nice " ( between Nice and MOnaco).

Best regards,
Fabien

 

[Benjamin Rowland]

Very impressive test.

 

[DucktileMedia]

Impressive but I have seen flags that are very light weight material that look like it is blowing much much harder than it really is. It seems the banner, tree tops and other rc plane dont react to the wind the same as the flags. I have been kitesurfing for 12 years and when the winds get above 20mph, treetops sway more than that. where are you getting 50-70 km/hr from? I'm not trying to start an argument but I just want to make sure that number is not an estimate. In 37 mph, sand gets stuck in my scalp for days. you cant hear your self yelling, you can lean forward and stay in place, flags are completely erect and loud, leaves are starting to tear off the trees and the ground is cleaned of anything laying on it. Just saying.

 

[E-Copter]

Hi,

it's not problems in telling these, as i'm not "selling" anything in this post, i just wondered what it would do when flying in these conditions. The best thing i can tell you is, listen to the big FXFC planes ( big gaz engines), you simply don"t hear them as the wind was directed in the opposite direction lol
I also had the exact same thinking as you when i saw the " mikrokopter" video where they said they flew in 50 / 60 km/h wind and then perform a far away zoom, very stable, to the ground. I did not believe this and wanted to test by myself ( i admit i have stupid ideas sometimes lol !). THe first thing was, hard to take off without flipping over the multirotor as soon as you start the engine ( i flipped it twice before i could take off when i made the first test without the camera, the camera weiht in fact helped to take off better lol).
Then, you can see that straight away, especialy on roll on the gimbal, you reach the mechanical limits almost all time because the multi takes so much angle that it's just.. useless ( you can also look at the multirotor front arm beeing all time in the camera field when trying to "hover" at the same location if front wind).
The wind conditions were real time because the day before there was a UAS demo day and they announced the wind + had an anemometer, and that day was FXFC claibration flights.
I was an exhibitor the day before, and that day i could not fly during official demos because the wind was so hard ( 60 to 75 km/h all time), i had to wait till 7 pm to be able to make just a overing and i spent 5 mn to wait for a small wind deceleration to hover, and then 6 mn fighting to.. land ( lol ) but at leat i could say " i did it" for myself. The multirotor flipped over several time on the ground when powered off ( lol ) and yeah, nobody could hear his neighbourg lol ! When they asked who wanted to go demo ( 16 companies were there), nobody went and finaly INfotron took the risk, followed by Survey copter. I definitly need to send the video, i'll upload it this morning

You will see how the machines shake in the air ( altitude variations for the Infotron and cyclic wobbling for Survey copter), that was kind of impressive.

For the large planes well it's FXFC championships with the best international teams, so yeah they fly pretty well ( lol ) even with high winds , i would not be able to do a quarter of what they do lol !

Anyway, i was not willing to advertise anything, it could have been 10 mph wind and that wuld be the same testing " willing", all i wanted was to test results in real conditions as like you i had doubts on some advertisings on internet, especially some late ones on Mikrokopter stuffs, and as i had same frames and same gimbal i gave it a go..and real airspeed and you can clearly see that it's worthless to try record anything and it can't be stable as it's advertised everywhere else in such wind speeds. IU did not see any kind of usable picture in my video which reinforce my feelign that in windy conditions, it's worhtless to try to rpove anything : mechanicaly the multirotors behave too badly...

But that was fun ( and yes, a bit stupid as i could have broken the camera ..) and very good teaching, as i realised that my video stabilisation was indeed better than the " professional" uav's thing for a very simpe fact: it seems that a multirotor, as long as it has enough power to sustain the wind ( sometime it was inclinated around 45° just to keep position and full throttle) , has less height variation in the gusts than a larger heli / coaxial heli ( larger rotor discs, more sensible despite the collective picth), and this is what is needed to track something on the ground, but there is a need to make a new kind of gimbal allowing enough travel and " flexibility" to accept extreme frames angles in the wind

Best regards,

Fabien

 

[E-Copter]

Hi,

here is another video, but from the Infotron UAV that flew also that day :

Best regards,

Fabien

 

[E-Copter]

and here is the Survey Copter video

You can se the coulds behind the hill travelling pretty fast lol !

BEst regards,
Fabien